Torgny Tholerus wrote:
> Bruno Marchal skrev:
>> Le 14-mars-07, à 08:51, Torgny Tholerus a écrit :
>>
>> Infinity is a logically impossible concept.
>>
>> I have read your little text. It is not so bad, actually ;). Some
>> early greeks have also defended the idea that GOD is finite. But I am
>> not convinced. I think that Plotinus' idea that God is infinite has
>> been a major advance in science, if not the major advance. We can come
>> back on this later.
> I have written some more about infinity, in the paper attached (3
> pages), called Infinity Does Not Exist.
>
> --
> Torgny Tholerus
Well it doesn't exist under the assumption that it doesn't exist. I actually agree with you that it doesn't exist - though not because it's *logically* impossible. I think what you've shown is that there are other consistent number systems - which just illustrates the point that what you get from logic and mathematics depends on what you take as axioms and rules of inference.
But the problem is that a lot of mathematics would become very difficult and convoluted if we didn't allow infinity (and infinitesimals). This doesn't bother physicists much because they are accustomed to regarding mathematics as an approximate model and only using as much "infinity" as seems useful.
Brent Meeker
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list.domain.name.hidden
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list-unsubscribe.domain.name.hidden
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
Received on Thu Mar 15 2007 - 15:16:35 PDT